I, the Jury (1953)

I really wanted to like this movie. I feel terribly cynical trashing it, and that's why I'm giving it a middling 5. Actually, I'm giving it a 5 because there were some superb performances.

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

One of the film's great tricks is that, for a time, you think it will go down a rabbit hole of unrealistic glorification.

The first film adaptation of a Mickey Spillane novel, filmed in 3D and starring one of the all-time nobodies, Biff Elliot, as Mike Hammer. He looks like William Bendix's younger brother and acts like Lon Chaney, Jr. in "Of Mice and Men." The selling point of any movie based on a Spillane story, aside from the violence, should be the dialogue. That's true here, with lots of tough noir one-liners. Unfortunately, many of those are bellowed by Elliot, who barges into every scene like he's mad someone made him take this job. Seriously, watch this guy stomp around. Someone hired this moose to act and this is what they got. Even the film's famous final scene is tainted by his inability to deliver a line with emotion.On the plus side, the movie was photographed by John Alton. He makes the most of the cheap production values. Good use of the Bradbury Building, which is recognizable to fans of films like D.O.A. and Blade Runner. Nice score from Franz Waxman. The supporting cast includes many lesser known actors but there are a few old pros like Preston Foster, John Qualen, and Elisha Cook, Jr. How any of them kept a straight face while that sack of meat was barking at them is beyond me. Attractive Peggie Castle makes an unconvincing psychologist and is even less convincing as a woman attracted to Elliot.This movie has a lot that prevents it from being great. But all of the other issues combined don't equal the sheer ineptitude of casting Biff Elliot as Mike Hammer. This was his film debut and he never did anything this big again. He worked fairly steady for decades, mostly in television. I have no idea why he was cast. Worked cheap? Saved the producer's life? Knew where the bodies were buried? I don't know. All I do know is he stinks in this.

You don't mess around with Mike Hammer (Biff Elliot). Hammer is searching for the killer of one of his best friends, and he's bent on revenge. He's accosted by three ugly hoods in a bar. The dapper leader sneers at Hammer and asks, "All right, who are you, and why you been nosin' around all --" That's as far as he gets. POW! Right in the kisser. Hammer, who is built like Boulder Dam, or maybe his overcoat is, brawls with the two remaining goons until he's decked with a simple wooden coat hanger.I grant you, it doesn't seem plausible, but then the whole movie is not much more than a crude assemblage of events that Hammer bulls his way through, insulting people as he goes, scoffing at the women who throw themselves at his feet, and all the time wearing the same unchanging expression, as of a guy who can't act but has suddenly found himself playing the lead in a picture that's sure to make a bundle.In the 50s, everyone gobbled up Mickey Spillane's pulp fiction. They couldn't wait for the next book or the movie that would be made from it. This was the first, I think. And it's last conversational exchange was known by all. Hammer plugs the murderer in the stomach. "Mike, how could you do this to me?" "It was easy." The movie sucks in almost all respect, except maybe for its use of the Bradley Building in L.A. Over the years, the Bradley Building served as an office for, among others, Edward G. Robinson, Fred MacMurray, Jack Nicholson, and Douglas Spader.I enjoyed this flick when it was released but I was only a kid, excited by a gruff and inarticulate angry man who could beat everybody else up and kill them if necessary. All brawn and few brains. (That's adolescence in a nutshell.) Now, old and worn, I find it almost intolerable. Elliot cannot act. Peggy Castle can act, although she doesn't have to. The supporting cast overacts outrageously under the incompetent direction, even such usually reliable players as Nestor Paiva.John Alton was a fine photographer but his images here -- the stark shadows, the glistening pavements, the ominous alleyways -- only serve to mask the emptiness of the movie. Franz Waxman, also a talented craftsman, should be sent to jail for his musical score. What he does to a clarinet is what my mother-in-law used to do to me.Mike Hammer is a private eye. The noirs were filled with private eyes like Philip Marlowe and Sam Spade. They were experienced, intelligent, tough, vulnerable, and flawed. They made mistakes. This one is more of a caricature of noir films. Hammer has no weaknesses whatever, nor any thoughts that might interfere with the movement of his fists. Compared to this, "The Maltese Falcon" is a masterpiece of subtlety and nuance.Pfui.

Quite a surprise, this one, based on the Mickey Spillane book, done very much in the film noir style and shot in 3-D! Actually watching this flat it is only the opening with the dying man crawling towards the camera with his hand reaching forward that I was aware of the 3-D origins and we are swiftly on to an absorbing thriller. Not as tough and sexy as the book but a really decent effort with some super shadowy location filming. Biff Elliot, of whom I had never heard, is fine in the lead, if not sensational but the crackling dialogue and constant action keep things moving along nicely while Peggie Castle is great as the femme fatale. Low budget and maybe nothing too special but tight and bold. Very likable.

This 1953 film is the first screen depiction of Mickey Spillanes famous detective character Mike Hammer and the only "film noir" I know of that was filmed in 3D. Other than that and the films memorable closing and opening scenes, this film isn't much. Most the cast is good, but the problem lies with the totally mis-cast Biff Elliot as Mike Hammer. He is to young and boyish looking. Ideally, Mike Hammer should be played by someone in their mid thirties or forties; old enough to have grown jaded and world weary, but still young enough to woo the babes and take the punches. Biff Elliot looks and acts like he just got out of detective school. Parklane productions blew it by casting Elliot, who not only wasn't the right type but an actor who never had any screen presence. No wonder he mostly never got more than bit parts after this. Being the first actor to play Mike Hammer is about the only role anyone recalls when his name comes up. Parklane did right in the next Mike Hammer film by casting Ralph Meeker. Even Robert Bray (MY GUN IS QUICK) made a more convincing Mike Hammer. In fact, even Armand Asante was better.